Southwestern Public Health (SWPH) is warning people in Oxford and Elgin counties of yet another batch of potential measles exposures as the health unit and a neighbouring public health authority battle a rapidly growing outbreak of the viral disease.

A Ford pickup rollover in Grimsby has sent 4 to hospital—one in life-threatening condition. Sunday, at approximately 9:35pm, Niagara Regional Police were called alongside the Grimsby Fire Department and Niagara Emergency Medical Service (NEMS) for a motor vehicle collision in the area of Woolverton Road and Kemp Road in Grimsby.

Police say a black Ford F150 was travelling south on Woolverton Road south of Kemp Road, when the vehicle lost control, ran off the road and rolled over an undetermined amount of times, ejecting an adult driver and an adult passenger. 

The driver was transported to an out of region hospital with life threatening injuries.

The passenger was transported to an out of region hospital with non-life threatening injuries.

Two children under the age of 16, were transported to an out of region hospital with serious injuries.

The collision remains under investigation.

Witnesses to the collision and motorists who were in the area with an operational dash-camera are encouraged to review their footage and contact the lead detective at 905-688-4111, option 3, badge 1008389 with any relevant information.

Members of the public who wish to provide information anonymously are encouraged to contact Crime Stoppers of Niagara online or by calling 1-800-222-8477.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford will take questions from media Monday for the first time since his Progressive Conservatives won their third-straight majority in a snap election last week.

Two people are in critical condition following a rescue attempt during a fire at a motel in east London, Monday morning.

For years, Twitter, now called X, has been a key platform for news organizations, offering a place for real-time updates, breaking news, and direct engagement with readers. However, X has undergone significant changes in recent years contributing to increased misinformation and resulting in an environment where news organizations struggle to be heard.

Additionally, X’s moderation policies have led to the proliferation of hate speech and harassment, creating challenges for journalists simply trying to share news with their readers.

After careful consideration we have decided to depart from the X platform and establish a stronger presence on Bluesky, a reliable and trustworthy alternative. This decision supports our values and our commitment to fostering a healthy digital discourse.

The Bluesky platform aligns with our belief in fostering an open and democratic space to share legitimate information and participate in thoughtful engagement.

As we have seen, social media platforms hold immense power over public discourse, and we believe it is crucial to support those that prioritize transparency, user control, and ethical governance.

By joining Bluesky, we are investing in a future where journalism and social media can coexist without compromising journalistic integrity.

Going forward, the Kingsville Times will provide real-time news updates and community-driven discussions on Bluesky and we invite our readers to follow us there.

Let’s all be a part of a more constructive and transparent news experience.

You can find us at @kingsvilletimes.bsky.social this week.

The post Why The Kingsville Times Is Leaving Twitter and Joining Bluesky appeared first on Kingsville Times.

Nickie Alice

It is with heavy hearts that we announce the passing of Nickie Alice, on February 3rd, 2025. She will be dearly missed by many extended family members and friends. Nickie is predeceased by her parents, John and Lucille Alice, and her brother, Larry Alice.

Arrangements entrusted to Kendrick Funeral Home. If desired, donations in Nickie’s memory may be made to the Windsor and Essex County Humane Society (1375 Provincial Rd, Windsor, ON N8W 5W6).

As per Nickie’s wishes, cremation has taken place, and a celebration of life will be held at a later date.

The post Nickie Alice (September 30, 1951 – February 3, 2025) appeared first on Kingsville Times.

CHILDREN PROGRAMS

Book Club for Kids — Paper Bag Princess
Thursday March 6th from 4:30-5:30 p.m.
Ages 7 – 12 yrs

Pick up a copy of the picture book Paper Bag Princess by Robert Munsch, and read it before the club. Then come in and tell us if you liked the book!

You’ll also get to participate in various Paper Bag Princess themed crafts!

Register online at www.essexcountylibrary.ca or call the library at 226-946-1529 ext. 445.

Image by Essex County Library

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DROP-IN ACTIVITY FOR ADULTS

Colouring & A Cup of Cocoa
Saturday March 8th and 22nd
1 – 3 p.m.

Drop into the branch and join other adults for a hot beverage and a simple creative activity. We will offer this program monthly.

Colouring offers tons of mental benefits. Just like meditation, colouring allows us to switch off our brains from other thoughts and focus only on the moment, helping to alleviate anxiety.

We provide the coloring materials and the cocoa.

Image by Essex County Library

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COMMUNITY PARTNER PROGRAMS FOR ADULTS

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Kingsville Crafting Hive
Wednesday March 5th & March 19th
5:30 – 7:30 p.m.

Crafting knows no boundaries, limits, or inhibitions …

“Kingsville’s Hive” is a space for everyone to share various crafting techniques

(1st & 3rd Wednesday of the month).

Image by Essex County Library

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Write On Drop-In:
Fridays from 1 – 3:30 p.m.

Join the quiet camaraderie and group accountability of this writer’s group! Quiet writing time for projects, with the occasional opportunity to brainstorm solutions to thorny problems with manuscripts.

Register online at www.essexcountylibrary.ca or call the library at 226-946-1529 ext. 445.

Image by Pexels from Pixabay

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Sit & Sew:
Mondays from 9 a.m. – 2 p.m.

Are you looking for a space to work on your sewing projects? Do you have your own sewing machine and would enjoy the company of other sewing enthusiasts?

Join us for Sit and Sew in our Program Room on Mondays from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Ironing board is supplied.

Image by Essex County Library

The post Programs and Activities at Kingsville Library This Week appeared first on Kingsville Times.

On Tuesday, President Donald Trump plans to impose a 25 per cent tariff on most imported Canadian goods and a 10 per cent tariff on Canadian oil and gas. Canada has said it will retaliate with a 25 per cent import tax on a multitude of American products.

Bumpy (Working Whiskers)
3-year-old Male Domestic Long Hair

Meet Bumpy, a remarkable cat with a heart as big as his courage. His shyness is a thin veil over a brave spirit that shines through in his daily interactions. Bumpy’s resilience is evident in the way he explores his surroundings, cautiously at first, but with growing confidence.

He’s a gentle soul who loves quiet moments and soft whispers of encouragement. Please note that Bumpy should go to a home with experienced cat owners who understand their body language.

Bumpy is a Working Whiskers, meaning he isn’t the ideal candidate for a home-setting. Bumpy is looking for a nice heated garage or barn to make his new home, with someone that will keep a close eye on him while he adjusts to this kind of lifestyle.

Visit windsorhumane.org to learn more about Bumpy and all of the other adoptable animals at the Windsor/Essex County Humane Society. Submit an inquiry about Bumpy today! 

The post Pet of the Week: Meet Bumpy appeared first on Kingsville Times.

Crowds of people packed into Wolf Performance Hall on Sunday to recognize members of London's Black communities for their contributions to arts, community service, sciences and more.

The Argyle Food Circle is a new group working to keep day-old food out of the garbage and into the stomachs of Londoners in-need. Organizer Mac Ross delivers baked goods and fresh vegetables directly to the doors of people who say they need food, no questions asked.

Following the Delta crash landing at Toronto Pearson airport, many were praising the flight attendants' calm response and professional demeanor. At Fanshawe College's Flight Service's program, that's a big part of the training.

CBC’s Stu Mills spoke with some homeowners who have installed heat pumps about their pros and cons.

Autoworkers in Windsor, Ont. describe a tense and emotional workplace atmosphere in the lead up to Tuesday — which could see the United States slap Canada with 25 per cent tariffs on most imports after a 30-day pause.

As London strives to approve more housing applications, it's also seeing more conflict with residents over increased density in established neighbourhoods.

The federal government says it’s making an advance payment of $30 million to Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation as part of negotiations of the First Nation’s treaty claim that involves nearly 11,000 acres of land in the Greater Toronto Area.

Despite the snap election call and the terrible weather for the last two weeks of the Ontario Election campaign, voter turnout was actually up slightly in the province. Voter turnout was 45.4 percent this year, up from 44.06 percent in the election held in June 2022.

The five Hamilton ridings beat the provincial turnout with a combined total turnout of 47.2 percent. Hamilton West-Ancaster-Dundas had the highest turnout at 54.73 percent and Hamilton Centre was the lowest at 42.43 percent.

How the parties fared in the 5 Hamilton ridings

In terms of the performance of the four main parties in Hamilton compared to 2022:

• The Hamilton NDP vote dropped 17 percent from 72,000 to just over 60,000. That includes counting the Sarah Jama vote as NDP in 2025 and Paul Miller who also ran as an independent in 2022.
• The Progressive Conservative vote in Hamilton was up 25 percent from 62,000 to 78,000 as their count improved in every riding, but most notably on Hamilton Mountain where PC Monica Ciriello won the seat for the first time in 30 years for her party.
• Percentage-wise the Liberals showed the biggest increase in voter support in Hamilton jumping 72 percent from 33,664 votes in 2022 to 58,000 this year. They failed to win a seat but showed significant gains in every riding.
• The Green Party dropped 19 percent from 11,000 in 2020 to just under 9,000 this year.

Interesting races from across the province:

• Bonnie Crombie came up short in her bid for a seat in her hometown of Mississauga, losing to former PC leader Patrick Brown’s mother-in-law, but she was successful in returning the Ontario Liberals to party status with five extra seats. Amont these was an upset win by former CP 24 Stephanie Smythe who defeated the NDP incumbent  Jill Andrews who had held the riding for 3 terms.
• For the second time the voters in Haldimand Norfolk have given Doug Ford the finger by returning Independent candidate Bobbi Ann Brady with a huge majority. Brady received over 33,000 votes, good for 64 percent of the votes cast, providing her with a nearly 21,000 vote margin over the PC candidate. It was the second-highest margin of victory for any winning candidate in the province. Brady had been a constituency manager for longtime former PC MPP Toby Barrett and was tipped to replace Barrett when he retired, but Ford’s team stepped in with an appointed candidate who Brady defeated  easily in 2022. Brown was a lifetime Conservative, and still voted with the party on many matters in the last term. Its time for Ford and his team to respect the wishes of the mostly Conservative voters in Haldimand Norfolk and invite Brady back into the fold.

Canadian cyclist Derek Gee won the O Gran Camino road race in Spain on Sunday, finishing with a 35-second edge over Italy's Davide Piganzoli.

Multiple 911 callers reported the fire on Swilken Burn just before 5 p.m. Saturday, saying they could see flames and thick black smoke pouring from the home.

Ukrainian-Canadians and Ukraine supporters in Ottawa have reacted with dismay to Donald Trump’s excoriation of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the White House.

A blustery and snowy winter storm brought white-knuckle driving to London-area roads on Saturday, as emergency crews tended to numerous collisions, including five that OPP says involved its vehicles.

The Ontario Liberal Party says its caucus has unanimously voted to support Bonnie Crombie to stay on as party leader—despite the fact she didn't win a seat in Thursday's election.

The good news for Hamilton’s paramedic  staff is that 62 percent of them say they are able to maintain a good work-life balance. The bad news is that 38 percent of them, just under 4 in 10 do not. That was one of the key findings from a survey of front-line paramedics conducted last year. 350 individuals or 81 percent participated in the survey, providing an accurate snapshot of the workforce.

38 percent said they had occasion to use support services made available to workers and 88 percent said the services were good or excellent. Paramedics work in a highly stressful environment—seeing and dealing with highly traumatic events. As a result they regularly rely on services like the Hamilton Paramedic Peer support team as well as external mental health care specialists.

From a workplace perspective one of the drawbacks paramedics experience is workload constraints that sometimes makes it difficult to provide shift relief to paramedics after they have finished a particularly difficult call.

 Several activities aimed at enhancing wellness were recommended by employees, some of which were implemented this year, with plans to continue the most requested activities such as therapy dogs and cooking classes while introducing additional activities in 2025 such as sports-related family events.   Of all of these measures, providing therapy dogs was the most preferred activity to support well-being in the workplace selected by 207 respondents, followed by exercise classes (144 respondents), meditation/yoga (138 respondents), and nutrition/cooking classes (131 respondents).

All of this information was presented to the Hamilton Emergency and Community Services Committee by Michael Sanderson Chief, Hamilton Paramedic Service last week. Committee members were impressed with the report, especially the fact that the participation rate in the survey was as high as it was at 88 percent.

Housing in Hamilton has become unaffordable for too many families. Young couples trying to buy their first home, seniors looking to downsize, and hardworking people in the middle—they’re all being priced out. The dream of homeownership, or even just finding an affordable place to rent, is slipping away.

The reason is simple: we’re not building enough homes. And we’re not building enough because we’ve created a system that makes it too slow, too complicated, and too expensive to get housing approved.

But here’s the good news: this is a problem we can solve. And we don’t have to look far for inspiration. Mississauga is showing us how to get it done.

Cutting the Red Tape Right now, in Hamilton, building even a modest mid-rise apartment can take years of jumping through bureaucratic hoops—rezoning, environmental studies, site plan approvals. By the time a developer gets the green light, interest rates have changed, material costs have skyrocketed, and the project is no longer financially viable.

Mississauga took a different approach. They introduced as-of-right zoning in transit corridors, meaning if a project fits within the city’s plan, it gets approved without unnecessary delays. Over 60 potential Major Transit Station Areas have been identified within Mississauga—key areas for the city’s future growth.

Hamilton should be doing the same. With LRT and GO stations coming, we should be pre-zoning these areas now so we can build when demand rises, not years later after a mountain of red tape. When we make it easier to build, supply goes up. And when supply goes up, prices come down.

Making Housing More Affordable Then there’s the issue of cost. Right now, developers in Hamilton are slapped with massive upfront fees just to break ground—development charges, parkland fees, community benefit charges. These costs don’t just hurt developers; they get passed down to renters and homebuyers.

Mississauga recognized this problem and acted. They’re waiving development charges for purpose-built rentals and affordable housing, cutting fees for non-profit builders, and offering real financial incentives to make housing more affordable. Effective immediately, the city has reduced residential development charges by 50%, and by 100% for family units (three-bedrooms) in purpose-built rental apartments. These incentives are available for shovel-ready projects that pull building permits before November 13, 2026.

Hamilton, on the other hand, has taken a much slower approach. A new bylaw will phase out development charge exemptions gradually over eight to ten years—far too slow to address our growing housing crisis. The phased approach might sound reasonable in theory, but in practice, it leaves us behind. Instead of bold action to lower costs and incentivize new builds, we’re dragging our feet, making it harder for developers to bring projects online quickly. Mayor Andrea Horwath insists the gradual phase-out is a balance between affordability and investment, but the reality is that Hamilton needs housing now, not in a decade.

Who Pays for Growth? A common counterargument to reducing development charges is that the cost of servicing new developments—water, sewage, roads—will fall on taxpayers. But this assumes that development charges are the only way to fund infrastructure. They aren’t.

Mississauga has a stronger industrial-commercial tax base than Hamilton, helping offset residential development costs. Hamilton, too, can balance this equation by fostering commercial growth alongside residential expansion. More businesses mean more tax revenue, which can be reinvested into infrastructure without overburdening homeowners.

Moreover, intensification in existing urban areas—like Barton Street and Main-King—often requires utility upgrades, but these costs can be planned for and phased in alongside development. Spreading costs over time, rather than front-loading them all onto new housing, is a smarter, fairer approach that keeps housing affordable while ensuring the city remains financially sustainable.

Building Smarter, Not Just Bigger This isn’t about paving over farmland or sprawling endlessly outward. It’s about using the land we already have more efficiently.

Mississauga has 124,000 new housing units planned—not by gobbling up greenspace, but by repurposing underutilized land. They’re turning old strip malls into mixed-use communities, building mid-rises along major streets, and allowing fourplexes in residential neighborhoods to create gentle density.

Hamilton has these opportunities, too. Imagine Barton Street and Upper James lined with new mid-rise apartments. Imagine converting underused parking lots into new homes. Imagine a city where young people can afford to stay, where seniors can downsize without leaving their communities, and where renters have real options.

Let’s Get to Work This isn’t just a Hamilton problem—it’s a crisis across Ontario. But instead of waiting for the province or Ottawa to step in, Hamilton should take the lead, just like Mississauga has.

We need to cut the red tape, lower the costs, and use our land wisely. We need a city that works for everyone—not just investors and speculators, but the families and workers who make Hamilton what it is.

It’s time to stop making excuses. It’s time to stop clinging to outdated processes just because “that’s how we’ve always done it.” It’s time to be bold, be smart, and start building a Hamilton that works for all of us.

Andrew Selman is a political commentator and data analyst based in Hamilton

The London area is an ideal place for Bald Eagles in the winter as our waterways are flowing, providing a food source before the majestic birds fly north in the spring.

Changemakers with Scarborough were in the spotlight this week, with the Malvern Family Resource Centre (MFRC) giving them the stage to tell their success stories in the hopes others in the community follow in their footsteps.

An independent candidate in Haldimand-Norfolk says she thinks her honest, genuine representation of her riding helped her defy the odds and recapture her seat in Queen’s Park in Thursday night’s election. 

Line De Matteis was one of just a few people to notice the cracks in a downtown Ottawa parking garage before its top floor partially gave out last week.